I love the new lerk. The sitting back and being all range-y in the older version was my favorite part of lerking! I think a cool alt-fire could be something like umbra, a percent chance for bullets to miss or stop, or whatever, or a smoke grenade effect that blots out vision to let the lerk escape, but uses up all the adrenaline points making fleeing a difficult task.

For a secondary fire for spore, how about he vents out a more potent cloud of spore from his sides that just envelopes his current position. Maybe it'll do damage to structures or heavy armor (or the ns2 equivalent).

I could see lerks flying in to bases, sporing, and flying out of the generated cloud.

What are the flight mechanics going to be like? Flapping like the original lerk, or gliding like the currently lurk. I remember the flapping allowed for circle strafing enemies with the spike attack.

For Spores secondary, how about a drop-on-the-spot version that's more better?Kind of like the Bile Demons in Dungeon Keeper.

That's what I was thinking too, basically a thicker version of spores. More like a liquid acid spray. It would have much shorter range, but the DPS would much higher than spores, and if a marine got hit by it, they wouldn't be able to run away from the DPS.

Either that, or you could just make it like Jarate. Mark the targets, and then they take more damage from all aliens. This, paired with the sniper attack would probably be pretty fun.

Idea about the sniper attack- What if when you shot, if you hold down the attack button your camera would follow the spike allowing you to influence it's movement slightly? Added accuracy at the cost of having to have your body sit still for a little longer.

Stoked. Remembering back to roughly 8 years ago when PT'ing started on NS, we all wished for lerk perch so bad. It was really too bad it was incredibly difficult to program and work with on the HL engine. I'm glad we can now live the full vision, Charlie. :)

I've always hated that Marines with Heavy Armor aren't affected by Spore at all. Sure, its probably a sealed environment, but Oxygen tanks have got to run out eventually, meaning the marine would have to refill it, or come out of his suit for air (or if it isn't sealed and he just has a gas mask then...). One could argue that "nanites" obviously purifies the Oxygen so here is a suggestion: Either make Heavy Armored marines take a lot less damage from Spores than un-armored marines, or the Spores have a natural desire to bind with Oxygen. Heavy Armored marines have an Oxygen health meter that doesn't give them limited Oxygen but acts as a health bar for their Oxygen tank. The extremely strong affinity for both the Spore and Oxygen to bind results in extra pressure on the Oxygen tank which does damage over time to the Oxygen tank. When it reaches critical levels, the Oxygen tank bursts (and possibly does damage to the heavy armor?) and the marine is vulnerable to the usual effect of spores once again.

As for the secondary weapon of Spore, is Umbra such a bad decision? If not for Umbraing other players, then for Umbraing the Lerk itself. I've played the Lerk with Spikes, Bite and both Spikes AND Bite, and while the Lerk is probably just a support class, I think it either needs some more offensive abilities that actual pack a punch, or an added defensive ability. Its not that hard to hit a really fast, flying Lerk with any weapon in NS1, especially if you're both in a long corridor. Unless the Spikes do damage that is equal to a Skulks Bite, the only advantage I see of being able to shoot from a distance is that the chances you won't get Knifed are lower. The Lerk needs bullet protection.

I love stripping away commander to soldier relations and turning the game into a run to the hive and click mouse 1, and repeat till victory.While the commander plays his little rts game isolated from the rest of the team.

Spore mines, Align's idea, spore spray (think flamethrower-ish), a spore cloud that burns through armor rather than health (in case of a medpack spam or whatever), or a thick, nontoxic spore cloud that blocks vision (basically a smoke grendade).

Hell, you could even make Umbra the alt fire.

I'm liking the idea of a spray, and vision blocking. Maybe a neuro-toxin that disables marine's vision. In game, the marine's vision would go really blurry and maybe swaying and color-undulating for a time. Again, this would require the lerk fly over the marines, so the range is much less than that of spores, and since it is a spray it would just be a time based effect (which they might be able to dodge as the lerk attempted it), not one that they could walk out of like spores.

For an alt+fire on the spore cloud how about a speed boost? Visually it would look like he's releasing an ink cloud meant for escape (not unlike a squid) and for a short time he has increased speed for escaping (or for swooping in and distracting)

For this, spot-drop spore alt fire suggestion... I'm picturing lerks swooping down and using alt fire amongst the enemy. I'd endorse it if it meant you could use the ability mid-flight. Whatever the alt-fire ends up being I'd suggest only that it encourage flight and use/skill in motion.

As for the design of the character itself, I can only think of one minor nit-pick about it. The roost ability would suggest powerful feet with which to clamp onto surfaces. In some cases I'm sure that will end up being a smooth ceiling (since for gameplay purposes you can't always rely on there being a pipe or overhead object to cling to). That said, I'd have made the claws significantly longer/sharper on the feet. Something to imply that there is piercing of the surface the lerk is attached to. To that end, you could also have some sort of impact marks, similar to bullet holes, where the claws have damaged the surface (a fading effect, like bullet holes would be). The opposing claw is very stubby and currently wouldn't facilitate this much. ... ok ok, like I said, very nit-picky.

I wonder if there is going to be any sort of slight up/down bobbing added to the first person view that would reflect the wings flapping.

My idea for the secondary attack would be a ball of goo (or other excretion, call it what you like) that the lerk can drop like a bomb on marines below while flying or perched. It would use nearly all of the lerks adrenaline eat away at the armor of marines and buildings in the area it hit/splashed. This would be a good alternative for late game when many marines are in heavy armor and thus spore becomes useless.

- Can be dropped while flying overhead, making a high risk, high reward scenario. Allows lerk some ability to damage (the armor of) groups of heavy armored marines

- Can be dropped while perched overhead, so the lerk can set "traps" by perching in the rafters in front of groups of marines, providing bonuses for scouting, plus making it even more important for marines to check nooks and crannies as they progress through the map.

- Allows bombing or strafing runs during base attacks so the lerk can make use of distractions to damage not only marines, but buildings too.

- Not another cloud type (more than one type of cloud attack seems both lazy and confusing for players).

Roost We plan on allowing the Lerk to hold his crouch key when near a ceiling to flip upside down and roost there. When roosting, his view is upside-down and he's able to spike and spore from above. This is something I really wanted in NS1 and I can't wait to see it in NS2!

Have a spore wich is covering more space with less damages. Or the opposite :A spore which cover only a small surface but with extra damage. A good way for people who know how to aim with spore, to do more damages to the target.

A spore with another effect :

_an hallucinogen gaz instead of damages, or a very foggy cloud with only a visibility impact (good support idea to cover an ally running away without impacting damage)_make the marine into it to move slower (so they can be more vulnerable too skulks, good support effect)._make the marine into it visible to every aliens.

Wing Flap idea :

Make some kind of proximity or range (your choice) cyclone able to light off the marine jetpack, so this one fall on the ground for one or two seconds).Ideal when marines have too much advance, and team have only a few skulk, so this support class is still able to defend and save the hive on a fast jetpack rush.

Spore alt-fire should work like ensnare does in starcraft, shooting out a extra thick version of spores that sticks to marines and slows them down for like 5 seconds. This way they'll be in the spore cloud longer and you can get some more spike damage. I imagine this would also work well in ambushes with other aliens. Heavies should still be immune to spore gas. It added to the "i'm a badass" feeling when walking around in a heavy.

Right, I figured Umbra would be a very natural alt fire for the spore cloud - and I always thought the mechanic was nice, since it made marines want to close the distance to get more shots in.

As for the goo idea, that makes sense too. Maybe it's got a charge time, but it could serve as a doorway-denial effect where the spore cloud makes more sense to have in a whole room. I like the idea of it eating away at armor too, although i would be hesitant to make a lerk be able to kill just anything.

Also, I hope the lerk's spike snipe ability isn't a 1-shot kill, as that could make playing a marine very frustrating, especially without a killcam or something.